Employment 2025

SPAIN Trends and Developments Contributed by: Jacobo Martínez, Juan Alonso and Luis Aguilar Romera, Eversheds Sutherland Spain

Social Charter or international instruments like ILO Convention No 158. The Supreme Court clarified that such provisions lack direct effect in Spanish law and cannot override statutory limits. Subsequently, on 19 July 2025, the Plenary of the Labour Chamber ( Sala de lo Social ) further con - firmed that courts have no authority to increase com - pensation in unfair dismissal cases, even in light of exceptional personal circumstances. The Chamber emphasised that this does not infringe Article 10 of ILO Convention No 158 or Article 24 of the European Social Charter, as both only require that compensation be “adequate,” without mandating specific amounts or methods. In its reasoning, the Supreme Court has stated that: • the “right to adequate compensation” is too vague – these are not directly enforceable mandates, but rather programmatic declarations that require legis - lative development; and • the current fixed compensation system applicable is indeed adequate, as it ensures uniformity and legal certainty for all employees. While this ruling reinforces uniformity and predictabil - ity, removing the risk of courts awarding higher com - pensation, it also leaves open the possibility of future legislative reform that could raise severance amounts significantly. The company may unilaterally approve the equality plan in the case of a negotiation impasse, and administrative silence is applicable to equality plans Unilateral approval/registration The Supreme Court Judgment No 545/2024, of 11 April, addressed two key issues concerning the devel - opment and registration of equality plans ( planes de igualdad ). As a first point, the Court held that when a company lacks employee representatives, it must initiate nego - tiations with the most representative trade unions in the relevant sector. However, if those unions either fail to respond or merely ask the company to “try again

later,” the company is entitled to unilaterally draft and submit its equality plan for registration. Historically, equality plans submitted without genuine negotiation were often rejected in REGCON (the reg - ister or equality plans), and in some cases, the com - pany faced sanctions. The April 2024 ruling clarified that if an employer can demonstrate that it has made repeated and unsuccessful efforts to engage with the unions, unilateral drafting and registration of the plan is permissible. Administrative silence Subsequently, on 20 November 2024, the Supreme Court issued multiple judgments reaffirming this posi - tion. In particular, in Judgment No 1295/2024 (Rec. No 63/2024), the Court reiterated the validity of unilateral registration in the event of a negotiation impasse, and further addressed the second key issue: the applica - bility of administrative silence in equality plan proce - dures. Specifically, the Court confirmed that when the com - petent public administration fails to respond within the legal three-month period, the equality plan shall be deemed automatically registered under the principle of positive administrative silence ( silencio administra - tivo positivo ). Significantly, in this judgment a reference is made to the earlier ruling of 11 April 2024, affirming that as established in that ruling, “in situations such as the one at hand, positive administrative silence is appli - cable”. This doctrinal alignment now provides clear guidance for companies facing union inaction or administrative delays in the equality plan process, offering a path forward that combines procedural diligence with legal certainty. Union leave time (crédito horario) must be justified. In its judgment of 11 June 2024, the Spanish Supreme Court ruled that an employer does not violate trade union freedom by requesting a general justification for the use of union leave time and rejecting to pay for time on leave that has not been so justified.

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